TOKYO (AFP) — Japan's Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda left Friday for the Swiss resort of Davos where he will push initiatives on climate change and the shaky global economy at the World Economic Forum.
Fukuda, who will chair the annual Group of Eight (G8) summit in July, was scheduled to deliver a speech on Saturday at the annual gathering of world business and political leaders.
"I place importance on the (Davos) meeting as it often helps set the tone for world opinion. I will make my statement with my sights set on the (G8) summit," Fukuda said in parliament.
He added Japan could make a great contribution to a solution to climate change with its technological clout. "I want to emphasise such a point there."
The premier told reporters before his departure that he would call on the world's major powers to cooperate in lifting global stockmakets from recent debacles.
"The United States may seem to be the most responsible for the problem but the global stockmarket plunge cannot be dealt with by a single country. It is important for all major countries to act at the same time," he said.
Fukuda headed to Switzerland amid sagging approval at home in his fourth month in office. The opposition last year won control of one house of parliament and is pushing for Fukuda to call a snap general election.
Fukuda is expected in his speech to promise concrete targets for Japan curbing carbon emissions after 2012, when obligations under the Kyoto Protocol expire.
Japan, despite championing the Kyoto Protocol, is far behind in meeting its commitments as its economy recovers from recession in the 1990s.
Japan was stung by criticism from environmentalists last month at a UN conference in Bali for siding with the United States in opposing an explicit goal for post-Kyoto commitments.
"I am now determined, in the very near future, to spell out how Japan will set its own national target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions," Fukuda wrote in Friday's Financial Times.
"In so doing, Japan can act as both a catalyst and a locomotive to further the roadmap so that the post-Kyoto framework will involve not a limited few but all responsible members of the international community," he wrote.
He signalled that Japan would also focus on Africa during its leadership of the G8.
"We must couple the fight against climate change with the fight against poverty and infectious diseases in Africa," he wrote.
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